Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Here are some photos of migratory field laborers from the 1940s. Before America entered the second world war, my mother's eldest sister (and my favorite aunt) served in the US Public Health Service and one of her jobs concerned New Jersey migrants.

These first photos were taken in July 1940 at Shawboro, NC, for the Farm Security Administration by Jack Delano. They show a family on their way north for the summer picking season. The family started out at their home in Florida and were destined for the truck farms of New Jersey. The photos belong to the set of photos in the LC Prints and Photos Division from the Office of War Information.

This next group of photos was taken in New Jersey in June 1942 by John Collier, as part of FSA's Migratory Camp Program. Most come from the large Seabrook Farm in Bridgeton, NJ. I've a vague sort of connection with this farm in that I met a woman in college who turned out to be a member of the farm-owning Seabrook family.

{LC caption: This truckload of Florida migrants had been on the way three days and three nights. It was raining much of the time, and one woman contracted pleurisy. The trip cost each person about eight dollars. They arrived at the camp at 4:30 a.m. in a drizzle.}

{LC caption: In the pouring rain, the newly arrived migrants find shelter under the recreation tent.}

{LC caption: Migrants arriving from Florida.}

{LC caption: Assistant supervisor of the government camp addressing the migrants who have just arrived from Florida.}

{LC caption: The camp doctor has a large practice in Bridgeton, but also gives his time to the migrant camp, where he works to curb venereal disease, malnutrition, and general rundown conditions of health.}

{As a PHS nurse, my aunt would have worn a uniform but not quite like these. LC caption: Red Cross workers who fed the migrants on their first day in camp.}

{LC caption: Seabrook Farm. Company houses built by Seabrook for migrant workers.}

{LC caption: Store which supplies the migrants with supplies.}

{LC caption: Migrants leaving camp for fields at 5:30 a.m.}

{LC caption: Migrants leaving camp for fields at 5:30 a.m.}

{LC caption: Farmers send their trucks at dawn to the migrant camp to carry pickers to the field.}

{Councilman and family on the stoop of their house; FSA (Farm Security Administration) agricultural workers' camp. Bridgeton, New Jersey. 1942. This photo comes from John Collier Jr.'s flickr photostream. }